Author Archives: Jill and Bud

We arrived in Maine on Thursday with the tail end of a thunderstorm. We’d followed the storm east and so got treated to several hours of downpours, some almost flooded roads, a few spectacular bolts of lightning and one tree down across three quarters of the road. This trip we opted to stay inland, rather than along the more crowded coast.

We’re staying at Fogg Brook Resort Campground and although some of the sites had new gravel “screenings”…

ours did not. By the time we got positioned so we could reach with the electrical cord, step out the door onto a gravel spot and open the slide without interference from tree branches we had a pretty fine mud hole for a driveway.

When the rain stopped (pretty much as soon as we were done setting up) and Matey and I could walk around we found the place was nicely landscaped.

It had a very nice office/store/clubhouse just past a row of trees.

There was also a pretty decent looking golf course.

Friday was a beautiful day. I took Matey with me and went to visit with our friend Barb where she was selling at the farmers market in Belfast. Matey and I walked a few blocks to the main part of town to the Post Office.

The square looking building in back is the side of the first mayors’s house. It’s now attached, New England style to the house in front.

We passed this place not far from the center of town. It looks to me like this was once a farmhouse. Behind the house are sheds leading to the barn, all attached. Now it’s all been converted to apartments.

Barb and I had a nice visit. It wasn’t too busy this early in the season. Barb had some spring bouquets of lilacs and lilies-of-the-valley as well as some perennials and dahlia tubers to sell. She always has some small pieces of pottery, but that can’t be the star of the show as this is a farmers market and deliberately kept to local produce.

I helped her pack up and then went to her place for a very quick visit and to pick up two packages we’d had delivered there. Bud got a new grill and I got a screen house.

I didn’t expect to see Barb again as this is planting season and she had many flower seedlings and dahlia tubers to get in the ground. But today (Saturday) she decided to take a break and drive out to see us; we were so glad. I made her (reluctantly) pose before she left. In the background you can see Bud sitting on the trailer steps overseeing his new grill which is on the picnic table. And Matey is standing in the screen house wondering why Barb and I left and when I’ll either come back or unzip the door for him.

So we got an extra visit with Barb, the screen house is a success, the grill is a success and the mud puddles dried up. And as a bonus, the Waggle pet monitor that I ordered as an upgrade because it would work in Canada as well as the U.S. finally started working after three tech calls and many resets. And tomorrow we head to Canada. All did end well.

Three weeks is a long time for us to be in one place. I was ready to move along even though it was hard to leave friends and family. But the time had come and Sunday we drove to Broadalbin in the southern Adirondacks.

It was easier to leave folks behind knowing we were going to finally visit our friends Dick and Sue Manning at the home they built on Sacandaga Lake more than 10 years ago.

Here Bud, Dick and Matey are enjoying their dining area. Everything in the house was designed to be energy efficient as well as practical and lovely. The floors are ash made from the slabs cut from logs to get to the heartwood for making baseball bats. What a beautiful use of what some would consider waste.

There’s plenty of light from skylights that have electronic shades. The window in the interior wall opposite the skylight is positioned to let the winter sun flood the upstairs bedroom behind it.

The living room is both airy and cozy…

with a wood stove and a system that circulates the warm air back down from the top of the house it stays snug in winter, too.

Solar panels provide most of the electricity in the summer and do a pretty good job in the winter, too, though the surrounding trees have grown up enough to keep them in partial shade with the lower winter sun.

I especially loved the enclosed back porch where you could sit among the trees.

Sue and I took Matey to walk the Auger Falls Loop Trail along the North Sacandaga River. We both admired the way the trees manage to grow among the rocks.

These mountains are not like the bare rock contours of the west. Here the years have worn the sharp rocks to soil and the trees grip the old bones of mountain where they still stick through.

We all enjoyed getting out in the woods…

and with the recent rains the falls were a delight to see and hear.

When we got back we joined Dick and Bud down by the lake.

We didn’t stay until sunset, but after a delicious supper I came back down to get a shot of the lowering sun.

The next day they came and spent time with us at our little campground. Not nearly as pretty as their place, but we had a great visit anyway.

And now we’ve moved again and are spending one night here at Sugar Ridge Campground in northern Vermont.

This is beautiful country…

and maybe the nicest commercial campground I’ve ever visited.

We’re visiting family and friends in Western New York for three weeks. The State Parks in the area have campgrounds that consist of an electric pedestal stuck in a field. And in the rainy spring that’s what’s likely to happen to your camper. Even a number of the commercial campgrounds are unpaved. So for three weeks in this season we chose the AA Royal Motel and Campground.

There’s not much for scenery and nowhere to walk Matey, but it has full hookups and paved sites, so we are warm and dry. We laughingly call it the trailer ghetto.

To be fair the place is kept up; our impression was distorted by this burnt-out trailer that apparently caught fire two days before we arrived. No one was hurt, but it’s so disconcerting to see that we keep the shade over our dinette pulled down to block the view.

We have been seeing a lot of people, and I have remembered to take a few photos. This is a picnic with long-time friends. Clockwise starting from Bud, we have Gary Truhn, Sue Horanburg Truhn, Sue Quiett Manning and Dick Manning. It’s so good to get together with them; we try to touch base whenever we’re in town.

And my good friend Erin Hickey and I managed to go on what was once an annual hike to see the spring wildflowers at Gulf Wilderness Park in Lockport. We always went around Mother’s Day.

Unfortunately, twenty years later the early flowers have come and gone, even in late April. This is Hepatica, but not in flower.

We did find a couple of Jack-in-the-Pulpits in bloom, they are a later blooming species.

Erin made sure my plant sale skills didn’t atrophy. I helped pot up some flowers for the plant sale she and a friend are spearheading at the local cat shelter where she volunteers.

Happily we made it here in time for our great great niece Aubrey’s first communion celebration. Here she is listening to the very touching letter her mom, our great niece Jayne, is reading to her for the occasion.

This is Jayne with her parents, our nephew and niece, Rob and Kellie Bebee.

Here’s the table of oldsters. Clockwise from the left: my sister Judy, my sister Joan, my brother Jim, my mom Marni, my sister-in-law Goody, Bud and me. Jim and Goody are Rob’s parents. Aubrey is one of my mom’s three great great grandchildren.

Jim and I even ventured out for a hayride, though Jim said it did his bad back no good.

We took advantage of Jim and Goody’s visit to have an early birthday lunch for Mom on Tuesday. At almost 105 Mom says it’s risky to anticipate, even by six days. We hope she’s kidding.

Our visit is a bit more than half over, and so far it has certainly been worth the less than stellar campsite.

We’re now in West Virginia at Tomlinson Run State Park. The site we wanted to go in showed an error in the power when we hooked up. Error 2: Open Ground. Not safe. So we chose another site; no power there at all. So we ended up here. The power, though only 30 Amp, is good. The site is a pull-through, so you’d think it would be easy to pull in and set up. Not so much. See how the land slopes sharply down?

At the front of the trailer that slope reached the driveway.

Look at the difference in the blocks under our stabilizers. One side has just one plastic block, the other a plastic block and a six inch block of wood.

And believe me, we were as far over on the flat part as we would fit.

Between filling with water, changing sites and trying to get positioned so we could get unhitched and level it took us two and a half hours to get set up, a record.

But in the end it is a lovely spot.

And I certainly enjoy the view over the dinette.

To be fair they don’t have a lot of flat ground to work with.

Today we played disc golf. It wasn’t the best course layout we’ve played.

But it, too, was lovely. (Those light colored “posts” are actually tubes with tree saplings growing in them.)

There were some interesting baskets…

amid interesting surroundings.

And best of all there were trilliums blooming.

When we got back from disc golf we found we had a new neighbor. And he has a large dog that barked at us. And I found two ticks on Matey’s head.

Still, this is our first stay in West Virginia so we get to add a new state to our map…

so unless someone moves into that site I guess the pluses outweigh the minuses.

After a day of hanging out in the park (and playing a bit of disc golf) we decided to do some more driving.

My cousin, Rich, told us about some Indian Mounds near Chillicothe, where he lives (sporadically). (My cousin Rich has three condos, one in Chillicothe, one in Fort Lauderdale and one in Seattle. In addition he has a daughter in London whom he visits frequently. Our paths never seem to cross. He flew to Western New York for the eclipse while we were in Hot Springs. Then he came to Chillicothe, but went back to Seattle before we got here.)

We decided to check out the mounds anyway. There are actually lots of mounds in this part of Ohio, most of which you would never notice because they have been plowed over and built upon. But five of the sites are being preserved as the Hopewell Culture National Historic Park. This is also a World Heritage Site. The visitors center is at the Mound City Group. There are 22 mounds (a 23rd was totally excavated before the area was protected and its location is unknown) enclosed in three miles of low earthwork walls.

Many artifacts were found here. Unfortunately for us the museum in the visitor center was being remodeled so no objects were on display. We did get to watch an interesting video introduction.

Mound seven was the largest mound. It was carefully built using layers of clay and sand. There were graves under some of the mounds, some with cremated remains. These mounds were all built from 500 BCE to 500 CE (Current Era).

Me being me, I was just as impressed with the huge sycamore tree.

We took the time to walk the nature trail…

where, quite appropriately, Ohio buckeye was growing.

We were meeting Rich’s partner, Ken, for lunch and we had a bit of time so got in nine holes of disc golf at a nearby park.

This is a rather wind blown Ken (we ate lunch outdoors because we had Matey). He posed for me in front of the plaque in Bennet Hall showing the Deans of Ohio University Chillicothe. Cousin Rich is the fourth from the left (retired 2011). Ken also took us on a brief tour of Chillicothe, which was the first state capital of Ohio and is a very picturesque town. You’ll have to take my word for that as I was busy listening and looking and never took any pictures. Anyway we had a great time and I was glad to finally meet Ken.

On the way back to the campground we stopped at another of the Hopewell sites, the Seip Earthworks.

One remarkable thing about these sites is that even though they are miles apart some contain the same elements. The Seip Earthworks has a square, a large circle and a small circle, as do four other sites. And in each one the square encompasses 27 acres.

It’s hard to discern the shapes from the ground, but here you can make out the small circle in the distance.

These are the fifth mounds we’ve visited. I reviewed them all to try to fit them together in my mind:

Poverty Point State and World Heritage Site, Northeastern Louisiana, on the Mississippi River Floodplain. 1700-1100 BCE!!

Hopewell Culture National Park and World Heritage Site, Chillicothe, Ohio, along the Scioto River. 500 BCE – 500 CE

Kolomoki Mounds State Park, southwestern Georgia, about 15 miles from the Chattahoochee River. 350 – 750 CE

Wickliffe Mounds State Historic Site, western Kentucky, along the Mississippi River. 1100 – 1350 CE

Emerald Mound, National Historic Landmark, just north of Natchez, Mississippi, along the Mississippi River. 1200 – 1750 CE The Emerald Mound was still being used at the time of European contact.

They don’t fit together well. I need a history of pre-Colombian North America written for a lay person. Any recommendations?

When I was making our plans for this leg of the journey I found out that Adler would be competing at the WGI World Winds Championships in Dayton and Northern Kentucky University Arenas this weekend. So I booked us into Stonelick State Park just east of Cincinnati and between the two venues.

It’s a pretty campground on a little lake…

but this weekend it was filled with campers with kids and dogs.

Yesterday morning Matey and I took a long walk through the woods.

I was happy to find May Apples,

red Trillium,

and Dogwood in bloom.

We then left Matey in the trailer and drove to the Cincinnati airport to pick up Jamie and Sean. We had lunch

at Grassroots and Vine in Fort Thomas, Kentucky.

We ate outside despite the chill because there was a baby shower taking up most of the tables inside and the din made it impossible to have a conversation. The food was great, though. After lunch we drove to watch Adler in the preliminary competition (where I forgot to take pictures) then dropped Jamie and Sean at their hotel.

Matey and I had a late walk.

We took another long walk along the lake this morning, because he was getting left behind again.

This time we picked up Jamie and Sean and drove to Dayton to watch the finals. We stayed for the awards. Here’s all the bands that made finals. There were scholastic and independent entries in three levels, A Class, Open Class and World Class. Adler’s band was entered in the highest class, the World Class.

They are the double column behind the Arkansas flag. They came in fifth, not bad since they were probably the smallest school competing in that class. I think they were pretty happy with their performance and their score.

This is the celebration after the awards. Obviously all the band members were excited. It was a fun day, but another long one. After awards we got to see Adler for about a minute and then he got on the bus back to Hot Springs and we took Jamie and Sean to the Dayton airport for their flight home.

When we got back to camp and I took poor Matey out for a walk, I was happy to see that most of the other campers had left. We have two more days here and will enjoy the peace and quiet.

Today we drove from Hot Springs to Fort Massac State Park in Metropolis, Illinois. It feels good to be moving again after 13 days in Hot Springs. As usual those days were filled with appointments. We had 10 visits between doctors, dentists and the vet. We also installed our new hitch and had a new mattress delivered. And I washed and waxed the trailer. Amidst all that we managed a few visits with Jamie and the family.

It turns out that this is the oldest state park in Illinois and I appreciate the mature trees.

Matey appreciates the grass, great for rolling.

There’s a disc golf course that wanders all through these woods and I’m looking forward to trying it.

We are right on the Ohio River.

And there is the fort. Being right on the Ohio River I thought this was probably a civil war fort. Nope. This was a French fort, built to keep the English from moving west into the then French territories.

Altogether this is a very nice park, and it’s great to be moving again.

We are back in Hot Springs, back at The Vista at the Lake where we sat out Bud’s knee replacement surgery a year ago. Better times this year.

We got here in time for me to see Adler compete in the state Winds competition for marching band. This is just the wind players with no percussion instruments or color guard. The percussion and color guard each compete separately. This is because it’s an indoor competition on the basketball court and the whole band wouldn’t fit. Adler was disappointed with their performance, I thought they looked and sounded great. They still won gold as they were the only school that sent a winds contingent!

The other thing we were in time for was the eclipse. Hot Springs was in the path of totality and we had clear skies. This is a shot of the start of the eclipse that Jamie took. She taped one lens of a pair of eclipse glasses over the camera lenses on her phone. I couldn’t get mine to focus, but hers came out pretty good.

Here’s the progression she took as the moon moved in front of the sun.

The sun is almost hidden.

At this point it was still bright out, just a bit dimmed. But if you look closely at the points of light in the shadow of the tree you can see that the smallest ones are all crescent shaped, like the occluded sun.

Here we are, Bud, me, Adler, Jacey and Tia, all on the back porch waiting for the last of the sun to be covered. (Bria is on the pool cover chasing leaves, oblivious to the whole thing.)

And then the sun was covered and you could look without the glasses. This is a photo with my phone. It makes the corona look way too large.

And though the sun didn’t look right, I did manage to catch one of the planets that showed up in the now darkened sky.

Adler remembered to take a picture of the darkness around us with the lighted clouds in the distance at the edge of the area of totality.

Jamie had her regular camera out, and took this shot.

That bright spot on the bottom wasn’t the sun being uncovered, that was a solar flare!

It was a wonderful experience and I’m glad we were here for it. And very glad we had clear skies. That night we had thunderstorms.

On Easter Sunday we came further east to Little River Park in Ringold, Oklahoma.

We are out of the desert and into the woods!

We have lots of space around us and it is very quiet here.

It was not quiet at the disc golf course we found. It was on the grounds of an International Paper plant.

They were working and it was noisy and stinky, but otherwise fun.

Back at Little River Park it was peaceful and quiet. Not even the fish were moving.

A storm front passed by last night with a chance of severe thunderstorms and hail. But although there were storms around us it stayed quiet here.

We woke up to a still and lovely dawn.

Matey and I found flowering dogwood…

and birdsfoot violets on our walk. I’m glad to be in the woods for spring.

We came to Lake Arrowhead State Park on Wednesday. You can see it has nice, paved level sites and they have some room around them. Also, we have great internet and we’re only about 15 miles from Wichita Falls, Texas. So we could get groceries and refill our propane, fill up with diesel and do the wash.

But this isn’t a place I’d come for vacation.

There’s a fairly large lake, but the water is brown. Still, folks were fishing…

and swimming.

Everything is pretty flat around here,

including the disc golf course.

The prettiest trail went up and along a levee.

The only hills were going up and coming back down the other side.

The most interesting thing on the trail was probably this culvert taking us under a road.

The park has its own old-time oil well.

I’d like it better if it weren’t working. It’s not far from our site and the low “pud, pud, pud” it makes under the clatter carries quite clearly to our site. It makes an odd backdrop to the bird calls.

Still, there is beauty in every landscape…

if you just look closely enough.

It’s spring here and the wildflowers are out. I learned that these are a hemiparisitic flower that grow from the roots of grasses. They can photosynthesize if conditions are right, otherwise they can get water and sugar from their host plant. Life constantly amazes me.

And though I had to walk a half mile to get this picture, there are Texas bluebonnets here.

So, a nice stop.